The Phoenix in Flight

by Sherwood Smith

  “I’ll be back for you,” he said hoarsely, and slipped out of the room, a sack dangling from one hand.

  Sara lay there until he was gone, then sat up and looked at the corpse on the floor.

  Much as she had hated Semion, the sight of his headless body shocked her numb with horror.

  Galen... Galen.

  The reality of violent death made her reach desperately across the gulf that separated her from Galen—who must be lying this very moment in the same slow-stiffening embrace of death.

  In the distance the sounds of shouts and jac-fire reached her, but she had no thoughts to spare for Semion’s satellites. Dry sobs wrenched her body as she stumbled to her carryall and withdrew an old book and a tiny perfume vial carved in the shape of a teardrop. Under the book’s cover was a tiny, hand-painted portrait of Galen. The serene face smiled out at her, the clear dark eyes looking beyond her into some dimension of unseen poetry, unheard music. Grief was crumbling the safety of her anger now, and it was impossible to control the strangling sobs as she carried the portrait into the bain.

  She dropped her wrapper on the floor and stepped down into the cleansing embrace of the bath, kissing the portrait clutched in one hand until it glistened wetly with her tears. Then, with her teeth, she unstoppered the green bottle, brought in case Semion discovered her intention: she had never once considered that there lay a different intention behind the Poets. A sharp scent pinched her nostrils and she tipped her head back, swallowing the contents without letting them touch her tongue.

  She flung the bottle aside and her hands closed on both sides of the portrait as she gazed desperately on it, trying to fill her mind only with memories of Galen. Behind her ribs fear fluttered; she was cold despite the warm water bubbling around her. But there was relief, too, that the woman had told the truth. There will be no pain, she had said, and there wasn’t.

  Sara’s gaze flickered away in a spasm, then fixed hard on the portrait again, but her mind was slipping away from her, and she no longer noticed what was happening to her body. The painted face melted into Galen’s features, alive and smiling, the first time he looked on her, the first time she sang for him, the first time they made love: an effortless swirl of remembered sound and feeling, then a sudden swoop of motion took her over the edge of an infinite fall with a barely registered sensation of gratitude.

  SIX

  ARTHELION

  Lenic Deralze was not surprised when Nemo met him at the adit Brandon had specified in their second exchange of messages. The Arkad dogs ranged freely throughout the Mandala and the surrounding archipelago, aided and tracked by the Palace computer, making up a formidably loyal additional layer of security.

  With Nemo at his side, no one would question his presence, for they would assume that without the dog, no door would open to him, no lift or transport operate. Unless he had a fairly high-level override, as indeed he did, courtesy of the Poets.

  As the gray walls of the sub-tunnel whizzed past, Deralze looked down at the dog curled up at his feet and reflected on the history the animal represented. A thousand years ago Nemo’s eponymic ancestor had saved the life of the boy Jaspar Arkad, who would become the first Panarch. Was this Nemo now shepherding the intended assassin of Jaspar’s remote descendant to his victim, thus closing a millennial circle? Deralze would have answered that question without hesitation a month ago, before his meeting with the Krysarch at the spaceport bar. Now he felt less certain.

  The transport carrier stopped and hissed open. The lift opposite opened as the dog approached.

  The lift moved more slowly than Deralze remembered. When it stopped, he took a deep breath and keyed the door, which slid open silently. Deralze was unprepared for the blow to his emotions when he smelled the familiar air of the Palace Minor, and saw the same elegant hallways he’d walked during the years he was Brandon’s bodyguard.

  As was traditional on the night of an Arkad’s Enkainion, no one was about. Still expecting a trap—there’s nothing like a conspirator on the watch for conspiracies—he made his way quickly to Brandon’s suite.

  Just short of the door, Nemo stopped and watched as Deralze approached it.

  It didn’t open. The Poets-supplied override wasn’t high enough for this wing of the palace.

  “Ghay mahl,” he said to the dog, the words coming back to him despite ten years’ absence.

  The dog just stood there, his mouth slightly open, his thickly-furred tail held low and twitching slightly side to side.

  Deralze let his breath out, reaching for the calm at the center of the Ulanshu Disciplines. He wasn’t about to try for his sleeve weapon, even though the poison slivers it delivered were near-instantaneous in effect. A dead dog wouldn’t open the door.

  He approached the dog. Nemo nosed his crotch, then trotted past him through the door, which whisked open silently.

  No guards or servants were within. Tradition demanded that Arkads be alone to meditate before making their Enkainion, and again, the heir before his or her coronation. Brandon’s suite looked unfamiliar without the usual swarm of valets, dogs and guards, yet it was familiar enough to cause a tightness in Deralze’s chest.

  Nemo trotted toward the bedchamber, looking back at Deralze as he paused at the door. Deralze followed the dog inside, where a single figure was outlined beneath the covers. The anger sparked again. Meditation on a life of Service? Brandon was sound asleep.

  I could take his head right now.

  Deralze was expected to. Some collector on Rifthaven, anonymous behind an escrow account, was waiting for the perfectly-preserved head of an Arkad.

  But that could wait. Lenic Deralze leaned down, hesitated, then ignoring the residual habits of his training, touched the bare shoulder of the young man lying asleep on the dormaivu.

  The reaction was instantaneous and violent.

  Brandon flung aside the bedcover and lifted his arm as though sighting along a firejac. Taking aim directly at Deralze’s face, he mumbled, “Under fire. Where’s the comm?”

  The dog came to alert, his fur ruffing up.

  Habit forced Deralze back a step and poised his wrist just short of delivering his sleeve-weapon... but there was no weapon in the Krysarch’s hand.

  Nemo barked once, ears intent as he focused on Deralze, then he relaxed as Brandon collapsed back in the bed.

  “Dream,” Brandon said, the hand that had pointed at Deralze dropping. “Hell. That you, Deralze?”

  Deralze pointed up at the ceiling.

  “No telltales,” Brandon murmured hoarsely. “Long ago learned how to get around Semion when I needed to. Damn, what a headache. And what a nightmare. Markham and I, under attack—” He squinted around the room as though shards of his dream images still lingered in the silent, vaulted corners. Then gave a twisted rueful grin that reminded Deralze of the young Krysarch he had served.

  The dog padded back to one of the many dog couches all over the suite.

  Markham. Deralze stared down in some bemusement at Brandon, who sat naked in his bed, digging the heels of his hands into his eye sockets. Under attack? Deralze had spent years making sure that the nyr-Arkad had never seen any kind of action, and had never experienced a threat from anyone.

  Nor, if rumor was correct, had he since Deralze left. The first and last time Brandon had been attacked had been the occasion of Deralze’s assignment to guard him, sixteen years ago. Brandon’s nightmare could only have been a residue of some expensive wiredream, compounded, no doubt, by a hangover, sexual exhaustion, or both. From the condition of the dormaivu, and the settings Deralze had glimpsed on the console, he guessed the party hadn’t happened here.

  Ten years of anger welled up in Deralze with undiminished strength. No telltales? He flicked a glance at Nemo. The dog’s head was down, but he was watching Deralze, the sable accents above his clear brown eyes underscoring his attention.

  Then caught a brief, speculative glance from Brandon’s blurred, bloodshot blue eyes.

  Does he se
e the threat, then? He hasn’t asked where I went after I disappeared from his service.

  “What did Eleris put in those drinks?” Brandon asked the ceiling, and yawned.

  “Shall I call up some detox, Highness?” Deralze spoke. Of course he just assumes my loyalty. He doesn’t see the threat—can’t imagine a threat—and so Markham was ruined, and he sits here pretending to hold a firejac after a night of carousing. Markham thinks Brandon was Semion’s real target? Markham was blinded by loyalty. And see what result it got him.

  “Detox.” Brandon sat up. “And coffee. Real, not caf. Bath.” He thrust his dark hair out of his eyes, then winced as if even that much movement was painful. “Chatz, my head hurts.”

  Deralze moved to the dormaivu’s console and tabbed the inlaid keys. From the bain came the sounds of water running. The door stood open, and Brandon breathed deeply of the drifting steam.

  Abruptly the wait hum ended and the dumbwaiter door opened above the console. Two glasses stood there, accompanied by the aromatic smell of real coffee, but Brandon picked up the cold glass of milky liquid first, grimaced at it, and gulped it down. He shuddered, then reached for the coffee, his face relaxing slightly as the detox diminished what must have been a lethal hangover.

  When Brandon looked up, his eyes were noticeably clearer. “Anyone see you come in?” he asked.

  “No one, Highness.” Deralze tried to hide his irritation. The stupidity of the question was a measure of Brandon’s hangover

  Brandon grinned, once again looking young despite the marks under his eyes and the bristle of day-old beard on cheeks and chin. “Doesn’t matter anyway, does it? With Nemo you’re basically invisible.”

  “Noticed a few more dog doors since my day.”

  “Always room for more dogs.” Brandon rubbed his eyes a last time. “But the Enkainion made it easy to bring you in. I can count the times I’ve been truly alone since...” He half-lifted a hand, almost a gesture of appeal, then opened it outward, toward the door. “You’ve done what I asked?”

  “The ship sits at the booster field right now.”

  Brandon grinned. It transformed his face, reminding Deralze of the old days, when Brandon and Markham studied together through nights, then sneaked out to get extra time in the piloting sims when the seniors were asleep or on duty. When they talked out every hundredth-point on the exams that they earned top scores at—scores that Markham was falsely accused of cheating for and cashiered while Brandon stood by and did nothing.

  I just wish you’d be able to find out how Semion is going to pay for that, before you pay, Deralze thought.

  The comm interrupted with its quiet bell-tone.

  “Yes?” Brandon said.

  The house computer’s even, singsong voice was just audible above the rushing of the water in the bain. “Holocom from the Aerenarch Semion vlith-Arkad, recorded, urgent, released 12-15-65 Standard from the planet Narbon.”

  “It can wait.” Brandon carried his coffee into the bain. A faint hiss indicated one of the dog doors opening, and in trotted a smaller edition of Nemo, an Arkad bitch, with a lanky pup at her heels.

  “If you want any coffee, help yourself,” Brandon said as the dogs sniffed each other and danced around Brandon.

  The Krysarch knelt down, wincing at his headache as he ran his hands over the new pair of dogs. “You saw Markham? And he asked about me?”

  “Yes, and yes.” Deralze did not intend to permit any of his ambivalence to show, but Brandon must have heard something because he gave Deralze an odd, narrow-eyed look, then straightened up, and the dogs trotted into another room and vanished.

  Brandon stepped down into the rushing water of the bath. Deralze saw little of the effects of what gossip reported to have been a spectacular ten-year drinking orgy in the slim figure. There was no flab on Brandon’s frame. The smooth brown skin was innocent of any scars, except the one along the back of his shoulder blade from the day Anaris, the hostage, attacked him.

  “Are you regretting your duplicity?” Brandon’s smile was wide, his gaze intent. “Now’s the time to make your choice.”

  “Choice?” Deralze’s heart slammed. His wrist flexed slightly below the sleeve jac. “Duplicity?”

  Brandon’s smile was twisted. “You made vows once to protect the system, and now you’re helping me to escape from it. My oldest brother, at least, would classify—”

  The bell toned again. “Chival Eleris vlith-Chandreseki, real-time, urgent,” the indifferent voice of the comm reported. The blue light on the little console indicated a two-way visual request.

  “Sorry. I’d better take this.” Brandon splashed to the edge of the bath, next to the inlaid console, and looked down, water dripping off his nose. “One last try,” he muttered under his breath; Deralze wondered if he was supposed to hear it. Then Brandon lifted his head. “Comm. Voice only.”

  At once, a musical soprano filled the steamy room. “Brandon darling...” Deralze had heard about the heir to the once-prominent Chandreseki shipyards. Looks of a holovid star and the morals of a chatz-house professional. He sidled a glance at Brandon. Why didn’t he take this com privately?

  “Good morning, Eleris.” Brandon grinned up at the afternoon light streaming in the high window on the other side of the bain.

  Her laugh rippled. “Good evening, my love! You could have stayed. Your special day is not yet over. I have many more delights planned for us.”

  “It was a wonderful day, Eleris, as was last night and the day before.”

  Her musical laugh rippled again, as calculated and lovely as a waterfall onstage. “Only I know how much you value your independence, Brandon dear, for you know I am exactly the same way.”

  She thinks Brandon is stupid.

  Brandon splashed water over his head, then sent an expressive look at Deralze. “Forgive my being stupid, Eleris,” he said, his words running in unsettling parallel to Deralze’s thoughts. “But I have to understand you. Are you suggesting we run away together—and kiss our hands to our relatives, and our lives of dreary protocol—and the Panarchy?”

  “Oh, Brandon!” The pretty sigh betrayed just a hint of exasperation.

  Deralze remembered the Gnostor Omilov taking Brandon and Galen semmata-fishing the first summer of his duty as bodyguard, in the Gulf of Luan on Charvann: the delicate play of man and massive fish, linked only by a gossamer thread that either could easily snap, but for the skill of the fisherman. Eleris’s voice reminded him of that thread.

  “So you won’t run away with me, then,” Brandon’s voice expressed only disappointment.

  “Brandon, there’s very little time left, and I must discuss tonight with you.” Eleris’s Douloi singsong became somewhat brisk. “I understand that the Arkads must ally with the Vakianos cartel, and you will signify your marriage with Phaelia Inesset by escorting her to the Enkainion Ball. My concern is the private reception afterward. Really, my dear, should we not begin as we mean to go on? If you are with me, you will find yourself pestered by fewer of the upstarts who wish to use your family connection to...”

  “Eleris.”

  The aria stopped. “Yes, my darling?” Her voice sounded as breathy as silk.

  “I’m sorry, but an urgent com from Steward Halkyn is incoming.”

  “Then I shall use the time to get ready for your Enkainion. But, Brandon, do not forget our arrangement. This is not the night to be abstracted, and it’s only for your own good...”

  ‘Good-bye, Eleris.” Brandon ended the com. “Abstracted,” he said to the water. “Extracted, rejected. It was the money after all, or maybe it wasn’t the money, but it was not me. The fool is always the last to know.” He splashed back, his mouth wry. “Money. Deralze? What was I talking about? Either you take the money and run—”

  The tone sounded again, and the computer softly identified the caller: “Dowager Archonei Inesset, real-time, urgent.”

  “Fire away!” Brandon squirted water between his hands, watching it shoot into the air a
nd splash down again. “Audio, no image.”

  “Your Highness,” an imperious female voice drawled in the purest Tetrad Centrum Douloi singsong. “I am calling you at the express request of the Aerenarch your brother. He indicated that he was sending you a congratulatory holocom...” She paused expectantly.

  Brandon hit the mute on the bath-side console. “Semion can’t be here, so he’s sent the heavy guns in,” he said, as if discussing someone else’s affairs—someone far away, not very well known, or liked.

  He lifted his finger off the mute. “I’ve not seen my brother’s communication yet,” he said pleasantly, letting his head fall back on the soft tile surrounding the bath so he could gaze at the sunburst mosaic on the ceiling.

  “I can tell you the content, Your Highness.”

  There was a stinging emphasis on the honorific. Deralze’s memories of Phaelia, encountered the year before Brandon went to Minerva as a cadet, stung with similar insistence: a sanctimonious girl who tattled on Brandon and Galen’s practical jokes, she’d insisted on rank precedence at all times, exhibiting a martyred affront when Brandon had relaxed it at social affairs.

  The Archonei’s voice thinned with false-ringing graciousness. “The Aerenarch, your esteemed brother, enjoined me to emphasize that should you wish to please your father. . .”

  “My father,” Brandon repeated voicelessly, and with a surge, rose out of the bath, then buried himself in a towel, his head bent—leaving Deralze wondering why Brandon did not want the Archonei hearing the Panarch named, yet permitted her to hear the surge and splash of the bath.

  The Archonei’s tone tightened a degree. “...you will escort Phaelia to your Enkainion. As a member of the Family I believe I may speak frankly, and I think it ramshackle to be arranging these things so late. You might have answered anytime during these last three days. I find it difficult to believe that you had business that necessitated remaining incommunicado.”

  When Brandon didn’t answer, the Archonei switched back to the graciousness, even coaxing. “But I do not intend to rebuke you on your day of honor. My daughter is willing to forgive these little slights as heedlessness resulting from the press of obligations surrounding your Enkainion. She has never failed in her duty, and stands ready to escort you to the Enkainion Ball, as a preliminary step toward the marriage treaty that will be to the benefit of us all. I say nothing about the reception after, though your accompanying her to it would enable you to avoid the impositions of those who wish to use your private life as a vector for their ambitions.”